The Secret Sauce??

Feb 20, 2017, 01:02 AM

hey all!, posted this over at Muse, and figured i’d post this here as well. so I’ll just copy/paste my post from there….

I recently picked up the Focusrite Scarlett 18i8. LOVE it! much better sounding preamps, quieter, etc. than my humble Presonus Audiobox. so I see that it can record up to 192kHz sample rate (!!!) which has got me to thinking and digging around the Googlenet in regards to what sample rate I should be recording at. now, I understand that 192 kHz/24 bit is the audiophile choice. but a lot of people record at 96kHz/24 bit as it is considered the high-resolution industry standard. I’ve also read a lot of naysaying on that point as well saying that the difference in quality is miniscule, don’t bother, just record at 44.1 OR if you must, 48khz/24 bit and you’ll be just fine, but i’m not so sure about that. it seems that recording at a higher resolution (96kHz/24bit or even 88kHz) would yield a much better sounding lower resolution copy for say a CD or something… or does it reeeaaally? I mean, suppose you do everything “RIGHT” as far as recording, mixing and mastering that a pro would do (you know, the other magic ingredients) except you do it all at 44.1Khz/24 bit. is the sound quality going to suffer that much? is this one of the main differences between the home brew guy and the Big Boys? I mean, obviously the only way for me to find out is to actually do it (and I am!, it’s just a lengthy process). I’m just curious as to what some of your experiences have been.

Crash symbols! You can train your ear to hear the difference in the extreme high end. Just record
a long crash symbol both ways and listen with headphones. You’ll see that the difference is really
nominal especially within a full mix. So what it really boils down to is 44.1@24 is just optimal for
digital processing because most people can’t hear the difference above that :)